


Vile In The Desert

by Sophisticated_Adult



Category: Rockman X | Mega Man X
Genre: Accidental Baby Acquisition, Dad Vile, Gen, I don't know what I'm doing I just like baby robots, Rated T for Vile, extremely vague handwavy AU setting, this is a No Canon Zone, yeah you heard me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-04
Updated: 2017-12-04
Packaged: 2019-02-10 15:27:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12914766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sophisticated_Adult/pseuds/Sophisticated_Adult
Summary: Vile finds himself in a strange new place, and winds up taking two strange child versions of X and Zero under his morally dubious wing.





	Vile In The Desert

**Author's Note:**

> just a fun side thing I'm not taking too seriously and I really don't have a plot for at all so if anyone wants to throw any prompts/ideas/scenes my way it's appreciated.

Ask him how he got here, and Vile would be just as clueless. He was pretty sure he was dead, last time he checked. He remembered the explosion well enough. The heat searing, shredding his back; X yelling. Hopefully it'd taken one or both of the assholes out with him, but his life didn't tend to have such happy outcomes. Right now the two of them were probably holding hands and declaring their love for each other over Sigma's corpse as society got up, shrugged, and collectively moved on from the ridiculous little revolt.

'Here' was pretty much some crappy desert wasteland, but at least there was a road winding over hills in the distance that would lead somewhere eventually. Vile was unsurprised to find his comms were down, but there was no-one he wanted to speak to and no-one who would help him out anyway. Such was the joy of being a non-Maverick Maverick who was solely in it for the unfettered violence. At least with Sigma there was no hand-wringing Ethics Committee constantly on his back, even when he met the mission goals in record time. Pfeh.

He'd been trudging along for not too long, getting sand in places sand had no right to be, when he heard an almighty commotion up ahead. The sight he came upon was enough to stop him right in his sand-clogged tracks.

It was clearly Zero, held aloft and struggling wildly, and it was clearly X, desperately tugging at the legs of the guy holding Zero, but it was like someone had hit them both with a shrink-ray. Vile watched, fascinated, as mini-Zero kicked his legs and screamed his tiny lungs out enough to make a banshee proud.

It happened fast enough that even Vile was impressed. The hapless human took one hand away to his ear, clearly trying to communicate with someone, giving mini-Zero enough advantage to smash his forehead right into the guy's face. Smash was the right word, too, as the blue gem on Zero's helmet shattered into pieces and into the guy's jaw. He screamed, stumbled back, and dropped the squirming little bastard. All in one movement Zero tucked into a roll, grabbed at X as he came to his feet, and sprinted them both the short distance to hide behind Vile's leg.

“Hey,” Vile drawled, looking down at his new charges. X ducked behind to avoid his line of sight, but Zero didn't even look up at him, gaze openly fixed on his once-captor. His eyes were narrowed, full of the kind of vicious, open hate that would probably make the X Vile knew cry. He approved. Still, they hadn't quite solved the problem just yet.

“You're just gonna leave him like that?” Vile indicated his head to where the man was stumbling around and swearing, hands clutched to his face. Five small points against Vile's boot increased their already impressive pressure as Zero hissed, “deserves it.”

“Deserves to not call backup, yanno. Here, I got it.” Vile strode forward. It only took a moment, the idiot was in too much of a state to even try defending himself. Vile grabbed the body as it fell, reached around to the ear he'd tried to go to before, ripped out the earpiece and stomped on it for good measure.

That felt good. He grinded his boot a bit more for the hell of it, then idly kicked the body away and looked to see if the kids were still there. Half-formed thoughts of having his very own tiny killing machine danced in his brain, but he'd rather not have to fight them every step of the way. Zero was the prize, but X could keep him happy enough to be useful to keep, too.

Good. Right where he'd left them.

“Picking the winning side?” Vile grinned as he swaggered over to them only a little theatrically. Neither of them moved. X was still huddled behind Zero, who blinked away from the discarded corpse to look up at him fearlessly. 

“You're not...” Zero spoke slowly, like he was working something out. “You're not with them.”

“I'm one one side, kid, and that's mine. But...” he pretended to strike a thinking pose. “I suppose you can join it if you want. But-” they both looked up at his sharp tone – “what makes you think I'm any better than the guy I just offed?” Not that he wanted to put them off it, but he really did want to check they weren't actually that dumb to just go with the guy who randomly showed up and the first thing they saw him do was murder someone, even if it worked out in their favour initially. 

“You're like us.” X's voice was quiet as he said it, but apparently clutching at Zero's hand like that made him brave enough to meet Vile eye-to-helmet for the first time.

“Oh?” Vile cocked his head to one side, chuckling at the thought of the Zero he knew loudly and angrily protesting – but the small version in front of him just nodded, once.

“Did you escape, too?” Zero asked. “I wasn't with 'em too long, but he was-” they shared a quick look between them. That was gonna get real old real fast. “A long time.”

“Uh, yeah, you kids are gonna have to tell me your whole tragic backstory at some point, cause I have no idea what-” he hesitated just slightly, but ah, fuck it, if anything X eventually swearing was something to look forward to - “what the hell you're going on about. I just got here.”

“Yeah, okay, we can – c'mere.” Still holding on to X with one hand, Zero grabbed at Vile's with the other. Bemused, Vile let his once-killer lead him across the sand, bearing a wide berth around the useless lump that still lay crumpled where Vile'd kicked it.

It didn't take too long to see what he was getting at. Down a short incline was the road, and an old covered pickup truck lay at an angle at the side, still with one door swung open.

“Sweet. Free ride.”

The trail up the dune was still there, showing the chaos of the struggle before Vile showed up. “Here, first-” he started kicking at the sand to cover it and they caught on quick, and in a short time they were piling into the backseat while Vile dropped behind the wheel and brought the door shut with a clang.

Yeah, so he'd never actually learned to properly drive these things, but it couldn't be harder than Ride Armour. Humans managed it, for crying out loud – it had to be easy enough for multitudes of those idiots to handle.

“Well, kiddies, where to?” 

“Away.”

“Not helpful. Pick a direction.”

“Forward,” X said, fussing over Zero's seatbelt. “We're not going back.”

“Thank you, X,” Vile said, because he might as well start trying to teach them some manners alongside the swearing. Preoccupied with figuring out the ignition, he missed the startled glance his slip of X's name got him. “There we go.” The engine hummed to life. Vile dusted his hands, pleased with himself, then remembered one more thing.

“And I'm not fixing that,” he said, deciding at the last minute not to lean back and flick Zero in the forehead, because 1. shoving his hand at a bunch of broken glass wasn't a great idea and 2. neither was inviting Zero to try his new trick a second time.

“Don't want it fixed,” Zero muttered sullenly, folding his arms and looking away. Ugh, kids. Save him now. They were supposed to be able to avoid all of this shit, but nooo. Some idiot had gone and thought that baby Reploids were a good idea.

**Author's Note:**

> so Zero either un-Mavericked himself there or it's just a cool thing that vaguely relates to a thing in canon but with some random guy instead of Sigma. this is the kind of fic you are dealing with. :V


End file.
